For the second installment of our Beach themed summer, I absolutely could not pass up this image of a striped beach umbrella. I focused on the umbrella itself and pulled my own colors, trading in the orange for green, and the blue of the sky for the Caribbean blue on the umbrella itself. Knowing the nature of hand dyeing, our rendition has been out in the weather for a while, showing plenty of variation in each shade.
For the fiber, I was thrilled to pull out Finn. They are a fascinating sheep, a breed developed possibly 4000 years ago, with examples of the fabric made of the wool from nearly 2000 years ago. Viking sails are made from their wool. The people of Finland have largely resisted ‘improving’ the breed (this is when you cross it with other breeds to bring in more desirable qualities), being satisfied with their multipurpose uses for wool, milk, and meat. They are a hardy breed suited to the cold temperatures, terrain, and short summers of their namesake land. They are also prolific lambers, generally having at least twins, up to septuplets. The wool itself is a sturdy medium wool that still feels soft for most people. It has a nice luster, and takes dye like a champ, making it a great fit for this light and bright colorway.
Of course I had to dye stripes in the sock yarn! I popped over to the Planned Pooling website as it is very handy to help design striping patterns (and even variegated yarns), and started noodling around. A good place to start is my vanilla striping pattern, as so:
It’s ok, but not really matching the picture with the uneven nature of the stripes, and the emphasis on the red and coral colors. After a number of variations (and thinking out of the box about how I could wind the yarn), I came up with this pattern:
I used Titanium Tiger Twist for the yarn, it’s a nice light yarn suitable for summer socks, or try a scarf or shawl with a modular pattern (or something like 10 Stitch) to stack up the stripes. Here’s how the yarn turned out, I hope you like it as much as I do!
Thanks for coming to the beach with me in June! I’ve got one more water/beach picture in the theme for July, you can hop right in and be a part of the fun, I’ve opened limited spots in the yarn and fiber clubs, with combos upon request. Stop by the shop to learn more about Tiger Club and sign up!
